Where My Heart Truly Rests
by ameliapemerson
Summary: A canon era MM story where love, loyalty, and trust all have their boundaries tested. I hope you'll go along with me on this exploration of our beloved OTP. Ch 1: Flashing forward...


_We're starting in the middle of this canon era story…. Just a glimpse into the present before the story flashes back to 1914…. **be gentle with me as it's gonna be angst ridden…_

XX

1917: Berles, France.

"Captain Crawley." The named barked out by the Regimental Sergeant Major at the door.

Matthew opened the door. "You're to report to Major Peters immediately. His office. You're to come with me now."

The sergeant looked in no mood for any delay on the younger man's part. His steely gaze drove into Matthew's eyes.

Matthew nodded shortly and returned to the room only to retrieve his cap and great coat. He then followed the RSM outside. The rain had stopped, thank God, even so the careful work Mason had done to ensure the Captain's boots were faultlessly shined, was now ruined as the mud flecked his buckles and the leather.

"Every little bit helps." Mason had quipped earlier in the afternoon, trying to put Matthew at some ease. "Put effort in to give a good appearance and that's half the battle won, that's what Mr. Carson used to say."

Matthew, grateful, but only half listening, continued to nervously adjust his Sam Browne belt. And it was more nervous action than anything else. Mason had also made a high polish of all the buttons and shined the belt.

Uniform dress, Matthew had learned soon after volunteering in 1915, was the most visible class signifier among the officer ranks. His privately tailored, well-cut service dress uniform called out his aristocratic connections. He had heard more than one so called lower born officer ridiculed in the mess for sloppy dress. "Christ man, who's your tailor?" And all laughed. Matthew, well aware of his own middle class roots, felt even more a fraud. He had determined at that point to be the best soldier, the best shot, the best leader he could possibly be. He had no alternative really.

For he had no future back at Downton. That was as dust. Gone forever.

And besides, what was the bloody point otherwise. He saw no purpose anymore to the war. No one did. Neither the Tommys or the Boche. Each knew it was a useless, stupid war; an exercise in killing. "We're here, because we're here, because we're here." The honor of fighting for king and country had gone west in a black cloud of high explosives somewhere last year on the killings grounds of the Somme. He had seen his men blown to bits by the artillery that his superiors had confidently announced had all been destroyed.

Not they told anyone that. That was to be kept strictly amongst themselves. Such talk was insubordination and could lead to dire consequences.

Ironic, Matthew thought as he marched slightly behind the RSM, for here he was about to be brought up on disciplinary charges.

Not, he reminded himself bitterly, not... though for cowardice. That he could never be accused of. Nor most, if not all, of his men. He had killed his fair share of the enemy. Had ran across No Man's Land and taken out dugouts and done hand to hand combat. Had returned shaken and bloody to his own trench lines.

When had it all become a blur? The hell of the Somme, he determined grimly. That day, July 1, 1916 when the lies had all become apparent. The objective, as told to all the officers, was to capture the German first and second positions from Serre south to the Albert–Bapaume road. The German guns, not destroyed by the constant shelling of weeks before, had counter attacked and they retreated. Nothing accomplished. Unless you count the almost 20,000 men dead. Numbers so large, in a war that had already seen millions killed, they took the form of a shapeless mass of humanity.

Except to the officers and men who had served with the dead. And now lived with the corpses strewn across the battlements and barbed wire.

At that point, as all rained chaos and blood around him, he became numb. It was, he knew, a survival mechanism. But it would help him survive.

No longer innocent. No longer the person he was. No longer the man who, in the year just past, indulged in dreams, flights of fancy in his mind late at night.

But not anymore.

He determined to forget. The time before the war. Before the mud. The death. The stench. When happiness seemed in his grasp. A time that no longer existed. He disciplined his mind to never let slip to those halcyon days of long summer nights, dancing at Sybil's ball with his girl on his arm. A stolen kiss as they twirled. Gentle fingers moving along the curvature of her hip until the hand of his beloved placed it firmly back along her waist with the loveliest smirk flitting across her face. Their future secured. Their marriage to be a mere few months away.

Then the war happened. Then he happened. He became a different person. A person Mary no longer recognized. A person Mary recoiled from.

No. He never thought of that time. Now by 1917 it was just the constant slog of the war.

He had let his disciplined mind slip only once. When on training in Berle. When the caress of a woman's touch crept across his face and he was lost. Lost to sensations he thought had long abandoned his mind and his body.

War does not allow for softness. So now he must pay the piper. Matthew's appearance in front of his Battalion second in command, Major Peters was expected. Ever since he had heard the rumors in the mess.

Someone had ratted him out. To whom he wasn't sure. But most assuredly it would go up the chain of command to Peters.

The knock on the door came as he expected it to the next day.

Matthew and Mason both wanted him to have as correct a military bearing as possible. For he was in deep trouble.

At the sergeant's terse request to follow him, Matthew placed his Service Dress cap, not floppy as he would have worn it in the trenches, but stiff as if for parade, on his head. He pulled his arms through the great coat and put on his leather gloves.

He was as ready as he was ever going to be. He had, as the legal training kicked in, looked up punishment for his supposed crime in the Army Act and Field Service Regulation manual. The disciplinary action, depending on evidence and leniency, varied from reprimand, severe reprimand, admonition, to cashiering.

"God help me." He muttered to himself when he had read that the night before. "Cashiered?" Kicked out. Summarily dismissed from the service without rank and then automatically conscripted as a private.

So out and back in without privilege of rank. But with the humiliation of guilt. The stain of abuse of his rank for not censoring his own lust.

He could never go back home. If he had ever considered Downton home.

These thoughts plagued his mind as he took this walk of shame to his battalion office headquarters.

He and the sergeant arrived at Peters' door. The sergeant opened it swiftly, announced Crawley's presence, saluted and stepped back.

Captain Matthew Crawley snapped to full attention. Saluted, called out his name and rank and presence. And waited. Eyes front. Glazed over. An unreality settling in around him.

Peters, head bowed with some reading glasses poised on the tip of his nose, slowly looked up.

"Stand at ease." He drawled out. Matthew stood down and took his cap off. Only then could he look his officer in the eye.

Peters returned the look with a wearied, tired gaze. Disappointment? Or the general ennui all the soldiers were feeling until the big spring push of 1918 in a few months? Matthew could not tell.

"We're both here Crawley," Peters started in… and then said to the younger man, "Sit down."

Matthew swallowed some bile and did so. Was this a good thing? Not being made to stand during the interrogation?

Was it even going to be an interrogation? Or would that follow at the trial?

Oh God. A trial… No his mind rebelled. Please God let this be settled outside of any court procedure.

He knew minor disciplinary actions were usually settled within the battalion. Usually with docking of pay, or field detention, or at worse military detention. Perhaps a demotion? How would his mother take a demotion?

Matthew eased himself uncomfortably into the hard backed chair. His eyes, tired and glassy, reflected those of his second in command.

Neither really wanted to be here.

Maybe it could be settled within the battalion. No reprimand sent back in dispatches.

"Crawley." The older man started in again. "The potential charges against you are quite serious. Gross indecency, behaving in a scandalous manner unbecoming the character of an officer and a gentleman."

The baldness of those words struck Matthew as if slapped across the face. Was it really as bad as that? He knew the regulations. But the context, the intent was missing.

Had he really become that person?

Peters continued. "I want to settle this without any kind of disciplinary hearing." Matthew's audible assent came out in a huff of air. "But…." And his eyes met Matthew's across the table. "I will need your cooperation. You must, in essence, confess. Otherwise I will be forced to take further action."

Matthew swallowed again. "Confess…?" His voice, so normally robust and commanding barking out orders to his men, became quiet and subdued. He would never confess. Such a thing was impossible. What was done was done in the utmost privacy. He would never betray her.

"You were seen, Crawley." Peters own voice commanding and firm. "Seen leaving a brother officer widow's hotel room." Here he paused. Matthew looked up. "Seen leaving on more than one occasion I might add."

"Damn…." Matthew's lips curled as he began to understand. He still started to evade when Peters voice became decisive and hard.

"Dammit is right, man. What were you thinking? Heyton's only been dead a few days. The news had barely been delivered to his wife when you went to see her. Presumably to take advantage…"

Matthew's head jerked up at that accusation.

Peters would brook no opposition from Matthew. His words became relentless "…in the worst tradition of the army. Taking advantage of a widow. A grieving widow. Pretending to be a concerned fellow officer. This will not go down well."

Matthew's hands started to shake. He bit his lip to keep it from quaking. He pinched his upper lip to try to keep the memories from filtering through his mind. Margaret's soft body under his own. He placing quick kisses up and down her torso.

Oh he was fucked alright. The charge was true. He was guilty.

Would word of his scandal get back to England via the inevitable rumor mill of returning soldiers? Back to York? To Downton? To Mary?

He gulped and tried to draw breath but none would come. At this moment he'd rather face a firing squad for cowardice than face Mary's downcast, disappointed eyes. How he had failed her. In everything.

How had this all come to be?

XX  
_Well there it is… a chapter more or less in the middle of this story. It's going to be angsty; it's going to be different. It's a revision of S2 where the scandal is Matthew's. But really that's only part of the story. Mary's life at Downton will also change dramatically in this story. She will become more involved in the war. Both will have to face obstacles to love and commitment that neither would have imagined in 1914. If you like this idea… and I hope you do…please review and tell me what you think._

_I did use one paraphrased quote from one of my favorite Brit WWI miniseries: Duchess of Duke Street:Episode Tea and a Wad... _


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